Cosmo Jones In Crime Smasher

2392. CRIME SMASHER (Cosmo Jones In Crime Smasher) (1943-usA). With FRANK GRAHAM, EDGAR KENNEDY, RICHARD CROMWELL, GALE STORM, MANTAN MORELAND. Two rival gangs generate a crime wave, which is keeping the cops busy day and night. Heading the city’s anti-crime crusade is Captain Murphy, an Irish cop with a dynamite temper. This part has been custom-created for popular slow-burn comic Edgar Kennedy. Sergeant Pat Flanagan is Murphy’s more reliable underling, a top-notch crime fighter with a special flare for attracting pretty women. However his one-and-only best girl is perky Susan Fleming (and what a treat it is to see 21-year-old bleach blonde Gale Storm in this role)! As the police struggle with murders and abductions, an eccentric fancy-talking amateur detective named Cosmo Jones enters the story. “Professor” Jones is a self-proclaimed expert in psychological criminology. A recent graduate of a correspondence course called The Art Of Detection,” he eagerly offers his services as a special investigator. Cosmo gets his first chance to prove his boasts when gorgeous oil heiress Phyllis Blake is abducted from a city street. If team of Murphy, Flanagan and Jones pursues the villains, with the assistance of Eustace Smith (beloved black comic actor Mantan Moreland in one of his most hilarious roles). Eustace talks to his feet, mugs shamelessly at every opportunity and ends up defeating a violent gang of hoodlums almost single-handedly. Supposedly based on the “Cosmo Jones” radio show; it has a brisk pace and also knows how to be funny. Amusingly cast as Cosmo is Frank Graham, a well-known radio announcer who died seven years after making the film. He was just 35-years-old! 58 minutes. Crime Mystery Suspense